The Message Remix (198 page)
Authors: Eugene H. Peterson
007
Shapely and graceful your sandaled feet,
and queenly your movement—
Shapely and graceful your sandaled feet,
and queenly your movement—
Your limbs are lithe and elegant,
the work of a master artist.
Your body is a chalice,
wine-filled.
Your skin is silken and tawny
like a field of wheat touched by the breeze.
Your breasts are like fawns,
twins of a gazelle.
Your neck is carved ivory, curved and slender.
Your eyes are wells of light, deep with mystery.
Quintessentially feminine!
Your profile turns all heads,
commanding attention.
The feelings I get when I see the high mountain ranges
—stirrings of desire, longings for the heights—
Remind me of you,
and I’m spoiled for anyone else!
Your beauty, within and without, is absolute,
dear lover, close companion.
You are tall and supple, like the palm tree,
and your full breasts are like sweet clusters of dates.
I say, “I’m going to climb that palm tree!
I’m going to caress its fruit!”
Oh yes! Your breasts
will be clusters of sweet fruit to me,
Your breath clean and cool like fresh mint,
your tongue and lips like the best wine.
The Womanthe work of a master artist.
Your body is a chalice,
wine-filled.
Your skin is silken and tawny
like a field of wheat touched by the breeze.
Your breasts are like fawns,
twins of a gazelle.
Your neck is carved ivory, curved and slender.
Your eyes are wells of light, deep with mystery.
Quintessentially feminine!
Your profile turns all heads,
commanding attention.
The feelings I get when I see the high mountain ranges
—stirrings of desire, longings for the heights—
Remind me of you,
and I’m spoiled for anyone else!
Your beauty, within and without, is absolute,
dear lover, close companion.
You are tall and supple, like the palm tree,
and your full breasts are like sweet clusters of dates.
I say, “I’m going to climb that palm tree!
I’m going to caress its fruit!”
Oh yes! Your breasts
will be clusters of sweet fruit to me,
Your breath clean and cool like fresh mint,
your tongue and lips like the best wine.
Yes, and yours are, too—my love’s kisses
flow from his lips to mine.
I am my lover’s.
I’m all he wants. I’m all the world to him!
Come, dear lover—
let’s tramp through the countryside.
Let’s sleep at some wayside inn,
then rise early and listen to bird-song.
Let’s look for wildflowers in bloom,
blackberry bushes blossoming white,
Fruit trees festooned
with cascading flowers.
And there I’ll give myself to you,
my love to your love!
flow from his lips to mine.
I am my lover’s.
I’m all he wants. I’m all the world to him!
Come, dear lover—
let’s tramp through the countryside.
Let’s sleep at some wayside inn,
then rise early and listen to bird-song.
Let’s look for wildflowers in bloom,
blackberry bushes blossoming white,
Fruit trees festooned
with cascading flowers.
And there I’ll give myself to you,
my love to your love!
Love-apples drench us with fragrance,
fertility surrounds, suffuses us,
Fruits fresh and preserved
that I’ve kept and saved just for you, my love.
fertility surrounds, suffuses us,
Fruits fresh and preserved
that I’ve kept and saved just for you, my love.
008
I wish you’d been my twin brother, sharing with me the breasts of my mother,
I wish you’d been my twin brother, sharing with me the breasts of my mother,
Playing outside in the street,
kissing in plain view of everyone,
and no one thinking anything of it.
I’d take you by the hand and bring you home
where I was raised by my mother.
You’d drink my wine
and kiss my cheeks.
kissing in plain view of everyone,
and no one thinking anything of it.
I’d take you by the hand and bring you home
where I was raised by my mother.
You’d drink my wine
and kiss my cheeks.
Imagine! His left hand cradling my head,
his right arm around my waist!
Oh, let me warn you, sisters in Jerusalem:
Don’t excite love, don’t stir it up,
until the time is ripe—and you’re ready.
The Chorushis right arm around my waist!
Oh, let me warn you, sisters in Jerusalem:
Don’t excite love, don’t stir it up,
until the time is ripe—and you’re ready.
Who is this I see coming up from the country,
arm in arm with her lover?
The Manarm in arm with her lover?
I found you under the apricot tree,
and woke you up to love.
Your mother went into labor under that tree,
and under that very tree she bore you.
The Womanand woke you up to love.
Your mother went into labor under that tree,
and under that very tree she bore you.
Hang my locket around your neck,
wear my ring on your finger.
Love is invincible facing danger and death.
Passion laughs at the terrors of hell.
The fire of love stops at nothing—
it sweeps everything before it.
Flood waters can’t drown love,
torrents of rain can’t put it out.
Love can’t be bought, love can’t be sold—
it’s not to be found in the marketplace.
My brothers used to worry about me:
wear my ring on your finger.
Love is invincible facing danger and death.
Passion laughs at the terrors of hell.
The fire of love stops at nothing—
it sweeps everything before it.
Flood waters can’t drown love,
torrents of rain can’t put it out.
Love can’t be bought, love can’t be sold—
it’s not to be found in the marketplace.
My brothers used to worry about me:
“Our little sister has no breasts.
What shall we do with our little sister
when men come asking for her?
She’s a virgin and vulnerable,
and we’ll protect her.
If they think she’s a wall, we’ll top it with barbed wire.
If they think she’s a door, we’ll barricade it.”
What shall we do with our little sister
when men come asking for her?
She’s a virgin and vulnerable,
and we’ll protect her.
If they think she’s a wall, we’ll top it with barbed wire.
If they think she’s a door, we’ll barricade it.”
Dear brothers, I’m a walled-in virgin still,
but my breasts are full—
And when my lover sees me,
he knows he’ll soon be satisfied.
The Manbut my breasts are full—
And when my lover sees me,
he knows he’ll soon be satisfied.
King Solomon may have vast vineyards
in lush, fertile country,
Where he hires others to work the ground.
People pay anything to get in on that bounty.
But
my
vineyard is all mine,
and I’m keeping it to myself.
You can have your vast vineyards, Solomon,
you and your greedy guests!
in lush, fertile country,
Where he hires others to work the ground.
People pay anything to get in on that bounty.
But
my
vineyard is all mine,
and I’m keeping it to myself.
You can have your vast vineyards, Solomon,
you and your greedy guests!
Oh, lady of the gardens,
my friends are with me listening.
Let me hear your voice!
The Womanmy friends are with me listening.
Let me hear your voice!
Run to me, dear lover.
Come like a gazelle.
Leap like a wild stag
on the spice mountains.
Come like a gazelle.
Leap like a wild stag
on the spice mountains.
PROPHETS
Over a period of several hundred years, the Hebrew people gave birth to
an extraordinary number of prophets—men and women distinguished by the power and skill with which they presented the reality of God.
They delivered God’s commands and promises and living presence to communities and nations who had been living on god-fantasies and god-lies.
an extraordinary number of prophets—men and women distinguished by the power and skill with which they presented the reality of God.
They delivered God’s commands and promises and living presence to communities and nations who had been living on god-fantasies and god-lies.
Everyone more or less believes in God. But most of us do our best to keep God on the margins of our lives or, failing that, refashion God to suit our convenience. Prophets insist that God is the sovereign center, not off in the wings awaiting our beck and call. And prophets insist that we deal with God as God reveals himself, not as we imagine him to be.
These men and women woke people up to the sovereign presence of God in their lives. They yelled, they wept, they rebuked, they soothed, they challenged, they comforted. They used words with power and imagination, whether blunt or subtle.
Sixteen of these prophets wrote what they spoke. We call them “the writing prophets.” They comprise the section from Isaiah to Malachi in our Bibles. These sixteen Hebrew prophets provide the help we so badly need if we are to stay alert and knowledgeable regarding the conditions in which we cultivate faithful and obedient lives before God. For the ways of the world—its assumptions, its values, its methods of going about its work—are never on the side of God. Never.
The prophets purge our imaginations of this world’s assumptions on how life is lived and what counts in life. Over and over again, God the Holy Spirit uses these prophets to separate his people from the cultures in which they live, putting them back on the path of simple faith and obedience and worship in defiance of all that the world admires and rewards. Prophets train us in discerning the difference between the ways of the world and the ways of the gospel, keeping us present to the Presence of God.
We don’t read very many pages into the Prophets before realizing that there was nothing easygoing about them. Prophets were not popular figures. They never achieved celebrity status. They were decidedly uncongenial to the temperaments and dispositions of the people with whom they lived. And the centuries have not mellowed them. It’s understandable that we should have a difficult time coming to terms with them. They aren’t particularly sensitive to our feelings. They have very modest, as we would say, “relationship skills.” We like leaders, especially religious leaders, who understand our problems (“come alongside us” is our idiom for it), leaders with a touch of glamour, leaders who look good on posters and on television.
The hard-rock reality is that prophets don’t fit into our way of life.
For a people who are accustomed to “fitting God” into their lives, or, as we like to say, “making room for God,” the prophets are hard to take and easy to dismiss. The God of whom the prophets speak is far too large to fit into our lives. If we want anything to do with God, we have to fit into him.
The prophets are not “reasonable,” accommodating themselves to what makes sense to us. They are not diplomatic, tactfully negotiating an agreement that allows us a “say” in the outcome. What they do is haul us unceremoniously into a reality far too large to be accounted for by our explanations and expectations. They plunge us into mystery, immense and staggering.
Their words and visions penetrate the illusions with which we cocoon ourselves from reality. We humans have an enormous capacity for denial and for self-deceit. We incapacitate ourselves from dealing with the consequences of sin, for facing judgment, for embracing truth. Then the prophets step in and help us to first recognize and then enter the new life God has for us, the life that hope in God opens up.
They don’t explain God. They shake us out of old conventional habits of small-mindedness, of trivializing god-gossip, and set us on our feet in wonder and obedience and worship. If we insist on understanding them before we live into them, we will never get it.
Basically, the prophets did two things: They worked to get people to accept the worst as
God’s
judgment—not a religious catastrophe or a political disaster, but
judgment
. If what seems like the worst turns out to be
God’s
judgment, it can be embraced, not denied or avoided, for God is good and intends our salvation. So judgment, while certainly not what we human beings anticipate in our planned future, can never be the worst that can happen. It is the best, for it is the work of God to set the world, and us, right.
God’s
judgment—not a religious catastrophe or a political disaster, but
judgment
. If what seems like the worst turns out to be
God’s
judgment, it can be embraced, not denied or avoided, for God is good and intends our salvation. So judgment, while certainly not what we human beings anticipate in our planned future, can never be the worst that can happen. It is the best, for it is the work of God to set the world, and us, right.
And the prophets worked to get people who were beaten down to open themselves up to hope in God’s future. In the wreckage of exile and death and humiliation and sin, the prophet ignited hope, opening lives to the new work of salvation that God is about at all times and everywhere.
One of the bad habits that we pick up early in our lives is separating things and people into secular and sacred. We assume that the secular is what we are more or less in charge of: our jobs, our time, our entertainment, our government, our social relations. The sacred is what God has charge of: worship and the Bible, heaven and hell, church and prayers. We then contrive to set aside a sacred place for God, designed, we say, to honor God but really intended to keep God in his place, leaving us free to have the final say about everything else that goes on.
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